Ely Museum has raised £220,000 to secure an artefact of national importance for the people of Cambridgeshire.

Made of 730g of almost pure gold, the Bronze Age necklace, known as a torc, was discovered by a metal detectorist in farmland near Ely in 2015.

It is regarded by the British Museum as one of the best examples of its kind found in more than a century.

The acquisition of the 3,000-year-old item was made possible after the museum called on the public to help raise the extra £8,000 needed to secure the relic.

Ely Museum curator Elie Hughes said: "We are very excited to have secured the torc and look forward to having it on display. We are delighted to be able to share it with local people in the district in which it was found.

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The final push to raise the extra £8,000 from local people was helped along by a visit from British Museum curator Neil Wilkin, who gave a talk on the torc at Ely Museum on July 27, describing its historical significance for the area.

The torc was discovered on freshly ploughed East Cambridgeshire farmland in 2015

Assistant curator at Ely Museum Sarah Adderson explained: "Two thousand pounds was given to us by John Shropshire, a local farming landowner who was very interested in archaeology.

"We are very very excited, having this object will be a big draw and centrepiece we can build around."

The museum says it already has a high level of security in place to protect its collections and previous national loans, but security will be reviewed in advance of the torc’s arrival.

The last Bronze Age artefact it acquired through the government Treasure Scheme was a bracelet discovered in another East Cambridgeshire farmer’s field in 2011.

The torc dates from around 1300-1100 BC

Torc facts

The East Cambridgeshire torc, which was found in farmland near Ely in 2015, is regarded as the best to be found in England in more than a century.

Bronze Age artefacts such as this are often discovered as stray finds in East Anglia, following the tradition of sacrificing objects by throwing them into boggy areas.

There has been much speculation about its use as it is so large. It may have been worn by pregnant women as a form or protection, or used to ornament a sacrificial animal.

A similar torc found in the area in 1844 is housed at Cambridge University’s Archaeology Museum.

The treasure is so valuable that the exact location where the find was uncovered in 2015 is being kept a secret to dissuade illegal night hawking.

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